She was staring at him, nodding. “I know. I saw your face.”
“Then you know that I can’t be the old York again and survive. I need to let him die.”
“York. I want a man who wants to know and follow Jesus. But I…”
“Loved the old York.”
“I love the new one too. I just don’t think he wants this RJ. And this is the only one I have.” A tear dripped off her chin.
He couldn’t breathe through the claws in his chest. She didn’t want the life he dreamed for them.
“I’m so sorry, York.”
His jaw clenched, and he blinked hard, his eyes burning. “Yeah. I get it.”
They stood there in silence, a gulf between them.
“I’ll go get Tate so we can question Sloan,” RJ said quietly, wiping her cheeks with her hands. She got up and headed for the door to fetch Tate from the barn.
And he just wanted to punch something. “I’ll get Sloan.”
He went down the hallway to the tiny bathroom. He unwound the rope securing the door.
“Sloan, I’m coming in, but you jump me, and you’ll regret it.” Apparently, he still had old York in him somewhere.
But when he opened the door, Sloan wasn’t standing on the toilet with the soap dispenser, waiting to clobber him.
And he wasn’t under the sink or even behind the door.
But York had the sneaking suspicion he was somewhere beyond the tiny open window, out into them thar hills, running for his life.
12
Her groom was going to have a heart attack before she even got him to the altar.
Glo couldn’t decide whom Tate blamed the most for Sloan’s escape—Sloan or himself for thinking Sloan couldn’t squeeze through the tiny bathroom window.
But he’d nearly lost his head when RJ came running out of the house with the news of Sloan’s escape.
Glo had been upstairs writing out her vows—things about loving Tate through every season and how she’d never let her fear push him away—and that’s when she heard him shout.
By the time she looked out the window, he’d galvanized his brothers in a search.
Reuben took the ranch truck, Knox on one of the horses, Tate in the four-wheeler, and Wyatt came into the house.
York had taken off into the backyard on foot.
Tate had found Sloan in less than an hour, near the road, hiding in a ditch. Glo didn’t mention the facial bruises on both of them when he hauled Sloan back to the ranch. It made Sloan look beat-up—but only toughened Tate’s hard-edged expression as he threw Sloan back into the bathroom, boarding up the window with plywood.
He retied the door shut, then grabbed a sofa pillow and sat on the floor, just down the hall from the door.
“Seriously? The night before our wedding?” She hunkered down next to him. “You need a decent night’s sleep.” She handed him a bag of ice for the bruise on his cheekbone. She’d already given one to Sloan right before Tate locked him away.
“I won’t sleep,” Tate said. “I can’t believe I was so stupid to fall for his lies.”
Glo nodded. “I even believed him. I didn’t want to, but—”
“He’s a lobbyist. A politician. Of course he’d twist things to make us believe him.”
She wound her fingers through his and leaned against his shoulder. “Do you think he wanted to talk to my mother so he could hurt her?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. But don’t worry—that’s not going to happen.”
“So, it’s over.”
He nodded and kissed the top of her head.
And sorry, but that wasn’t enough. She pressed her hand against his cheek and kissed him. The kind of kiss that said exactly what she’d written in her vows—that she trusted him. Loved him, even when she was afraid. Believed in him.
Believed in their happy ending.
He made a sound deep in the back of his throat, unlatching his hand and winding his arm around her, pulling her against him. As if he might be vowing to her the same things.
He tasted of the night, his whiskers scraping her face, his grip tight, and tomorrow couldn’t arrive fast enough.
Especially when he deepened his kiss, right there in the dark hallway of their house.
Oh, Tate, I love you too.
He finally broke away, breathing a little hard, and met her eyes. “Go to bed, Glo. We’re pretty safe here in the hallway of my house, but the fact we’re getting married tomorrow is playing a game in my head, and I need you to walk away from me.”
By the heat in his eyes, he wasn’t kidding. She caught his face in her hands, gave him one last quick kiss, and got up. “Please don’t spend the night in the hallway.”
He gave her a smile. “Everything is going to be okay. We’re going to have an unforgettable day tomorrow.”
“Okay, Marshal Dillon, have a good night.”
She left him there.
And resisted the urge to return to him all night long.
But maybe he was right because she woke to glorious blue skies, the sun arching over the eastern horizon, the wind sweeping the scent of lodgepole pine and prairie grasses into her open windows. Gerri had generously given up her master bedroom for Glo and Cher. Dixie and Elijah Blue had found hotel rooms in town, and her mother and her security team, as well as her father, had arrived last night at the vacation house Tate had rented.
Tate wanted to clear the air with her mother, but of course her mother was innocent. RJ was weaving a conspiracy theory out of mid-air.
And, the last thing Glo wanted was her fiction darkening her wedding day.
Cher had hired a minister from Geraldine who’d agreed to the hasty ceremony. Glo’s mother wasn’t thrilled with the family-only event, but she wouldn’t have been happy with anything less than a star-studded gala on the lawns of the Jackson estate, Glo in a ball gown and tiara.
Hardly a production they could pull off with only two weeks before the election.
Besides, Glo wasn’t a ball gown and tiara kind of girl.
Her wedding dress hung from a hanger on the closet door, the short, gauzy veil with the vintage white cap hanging nearby, and her crystal-studded white cowboy boots in a bag on a third hanger.
Cher hadn’t been able to rent a tux for Tate, so he was wearing one of his suits. Not her first choice, but Tate would look amazing in a burlap bag, so Glo didn’t care.
In fact, the only thing she wanted was Tate, at the altar, his hands in hers, saying I do.
I do and will forever and ever, amen.
Yes, she’d been silly to be so afraid of some kind of disaster destroying her day. Her future.
You have to believe that no matter what happens, you’re going to be okay. That God’s grace is enough. Dixie’s words. Glo was determined to believe she was right.
She found the kitchen abuzz with activity when she came downstairs in a bathrobe, her hair back in a bandanna.
Cher and Kelsey sat at the table winding twine around chrysanthemums to affix to the folding chairs Knox had picked up from their small church in town. Gerri was marinating the chicken and beef for the kebabs while Gilly finished loading a two-tier tray of cupcakes.
Outside, Glo spotted Swamp and Rags, two of her security detail. They’d spent the night at the vacation house, so a good bet was that her mother was nearby. And hopefully her father, although he’d probably be out in the barn or somewhere on the ranch in conversation with one of the guys.